He nodded. “Sounds pretty. With your dark hair, I bet it was.”
She ran her hands over his strong abs, tracing each one of them. There was no hurrying tonight. She wondered if he felt that, too.
He stroked his hand from her chin, down her neck, to her chest. She shivered, goosebumps breaking out on her skin. Yes, she wanted him. He tilted his head to the side. “You smell like strawberries. I love it.”
She did? “I’ve been using whatever soap and shampoo you have here. I’m not sure what it smells like other than clean.”
He grinned. “No, it’s your natural scent.” He placed his nose up against her skin, breathing her in deeply.
Elliot kissed her, from her chin down to her stomach. She shuddered. This was… heaven, as the humans would say. He tugged off her pants and then her underwear, throwing them aside.
“You still have your clothes on, and I can’t reach them.”
He laughed, before he spelled them away. She groaned. “I liked taking them off you.”
“Next time. Besides, I’m so hard it would have hurt.” He smiled at her. “You do that to me.”
She kissed his chin. “If you say so.”
“I do. And proof, as they say, is in the visualization of it, right? Take a look, baby.”
He’d never called her that before, and she liked the endearment as much as she did enjoy the size of his cock. She reached forward and stroked it. He sucked in his breath. “Damn.”
“I know I’m supposed to just look with my eyes. But how could I resist touching it if you’re going to point it out like that?”
She loved when Elliot gave her what she thought of as his sardonic grin. “Do I seem like I’m complaining, Mel?”
No, he really didn’t.
He dropped his head, which made it impossible for her to keep her grip on his cock because of the reshuffling of their bodies. His head was back where it was before. Elliot kissed both of her thighs before planting a kiss on her pussy. She cried out just from the smooth feel of his lips on her most sensitive spot.
He licked his tongue over her clit, really seeming to focus his attention there. She closed her eyes, enjoying the moment and not letting herself think of anything else. He grabbed onto one of her knees and squeezed. It helped. He must have remembered what oral was like for her. She needed him to keep her here, or she’d oh… He squeezed her knee again.
Elliot lifted his head; his nostrils flared. “I want to do this all night, but I need you so much, baby. Can I… can I make it up to you?”
Make it up to her? Did he think she was upset? “Elliot, I need you too and there is nothing I’d like more than you inside of me.”
He nodded. “Thank fuck for that.”
She grinned at his phrasing as he pushed himself inside of her. Her body stretched to meet him. The few times they’d been together now had gotten her better at accommodating him when he first pressed his cock deep inside of her. She loved the feeling.
Melanie wrapped her arms around his neck and held on. This time was different. His movements were less practiced. He was really lost to this and that was just what she wanted because she was, too. He jerked against her clit, and she shattered. There had been so much tension it was like she simply needed to… explode.
Her back arched, pushing her sensitive nipples into his chest. He moaned a long sound before he emptied inside of her. She panted, barely able to breathe but never happier in her whole life.
Whatever might go wrong could go wrong later.
For now, there was just bliss.
* * *
If the ghost came during the night, Melanie didn’t notice. It was possible that Elliot knew. He hadn’t slept, not a wink. He hadn’t even seemed all that surprised about it, and they’d gone down to breakfast like he’d had a good night’s sleep.
Three books plus a shake from Ava greeted her in the kitchen. Mitchell, Stefan, and Eleanor had all sent ghost books. In addition to finally getting through the rest of the boxes, she at least knew what she was going to be doing that day.
Elliot yawned, his only indication so far of being tired, before he sat down to drink coffee and ate in silence. He looked up and grinned at her. “You’re quiet.”
“I’m thinking about going through these books.”
He nodded. “You read. I’ll write.”
She loved how he didn’t need entertainment because he could simply find something to take away his attention any time he wanted. Maybe someone else would want to be constantly talked to, but she’d never been that person.
Melanie sat down to read.
Ten minutes later she was taking notes. Usually, she did this just for cases, to go over the law. Witching laws were complicated. They were derived from human laws from the times witches had been in hiding, but ultimately, they were more complicated. She was good at picking them apart. Melanie didn’t have a lot of clients these days, but the ones she had usually won.
She sighed. Unless, they were murdered by their ex-husbands. Melanie set that aside. There was nothing—yet—she could do about Peter Evans, but she would. She’d find a way. If she could ever dig him out of the shallow grave Lawson might put him in.
She started reading. The journal that Mitchell translated, that Elliot couldn’t keep a memory of, was odd. These weren’t spells she’d ever seen anywhere, and she had been in ancient and advanced spell casting in school. Still, it was strange.
Spells were about moving pieces of magic that already existed through the filter of a witch’s own personal skills, the things they could naturally do. It was a mixture of instinct, natural ability, and training. She’d always been pretty high up in power, but she’d never be able to do certain things because she didn’t have the natural affinity for it. No one knew what they had until the powers manifested sometime in adolescence or maybe slightly later.
And these spells seemed… off. It was like it was trying to create magic where there wasn’t any magic to begin with.
She chewed on her lip and tapped the table.
“Reading something interesting?” Elliot plopped down next to her as Edward came into the room carrying a box that he started loading dishes into. She watched him for a second before she answered Elliot.
“Why would your ancestor have needed spells to create magic?”
He scratched his head. “Who?”
She held up the journal. Not that he could see it. “The journal you’re having trouble remembering, it’s about creating magic.”
His face fell. “I’m forgetting things. When did that happen?”
Edward stopped packing the box with the good china and stared at them. She made eye contact with the man before she placed her hand on Elliot’s shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. Seriously. Not important.” She kissed his cheek. The last thing she wanted to do was make him upset. “I’m just studying something, and I’m about to set it down and see if I can get rid of the ghosts here because it seems nonsensical to me.”
He groaned. “Mel, I’ve told you that they’ve always been here.”
“Yes, but why don’t I know about them?”
The house groaned and a second later the doorbell rang. A picture popped above the table, and Melanie sat forward.
Elliot chewed his fingernail. “It has to be an Enforcer to get through the wards. Who is it?”
“Lawson, and he has my parents with him.” She was on her feet. Melanie hadn’t seen her parents since the night she’d almost died. How long had that been? Days? She was losing track of things in this house.
“Your parents? Awesome.” Elliot got to his feet as she rushed to greet them at the door.
She missed them so much that she didn’t let them say a word before her arms were around them, squeezing them both tightly. Mel didn’t see them very much on a day-to-day basis, but right then she’d never been so happy to see her family as she was in that moment.
Lawson nodded at her. “They wanted to see you. I’ll be back in a few hours. We may finally have h
im, Mel. He’s getting sloppy. Thinks we’ve moved on.”
She grinned at him. “Thanks.”
“No problem. Thanks for last night, Elliot.”
They shook hands, and whatever they said to each other, she ignored because her mother cupped her cheeks in her hands. “You look so much better than the last time I saw you.”
“I feel so much better.”
Her father looked around. “It’s so strange to be here. Looks like we never left.”
A pop indicated Lawson had left, and Elliot turned toward her father who embraced him. The move startled her before she remembered the simple fact that they’d known him when he’d been a young child and had watched him grow up. Elliot thought of them as family in a world where he had none. Her mother let go of her and hugged him longer than her father had.
“Welcome. So glad to ah… see you.” He smirked. “So to speak.”
“Oh, Elliot.” Her mother sniffed. “It was one thing to see it over the messaging, another to see you like this. I’m so sorry.”
He shrugged. “You know us Boothe men, we have to make big exits. Come in, are you hungry?”
She smiled. “His mother was like that. She’d offer me food when I showed up for work every day while my own home— on her own property, that she kept stocked with food that she’d paid for—was a hundred yards away from her front door.
He grinned, looking over his shoulder. “I’d forgotten that. Thanks for that memory.”
She lost her own smile. Memory. His was going. Now he didn’t even know he’d forgotten the journal. She rubbed the back of her neck and tried not to dwell on it. This was a natural progression of something she couldn’t control.
Melanie looked down at her feet. She had to pull this together. Her parents would see right through it.
He spun around. “Hey, here’s a question. You guys saw the ghosts when you lived here?”
“Oh yes, I actually learned some gardening techniques from the one outside. Sure, that crew has always been here. How many were there? Five?” Her father nodded as he spoke.
Her mother held up her fingers. “Six.”
With a rub of his chin, Elliot spoke again. “So tell me how it is that you know all that, and that Melanie was here all the time as a child, but she has never seen the ghosts before now?”
Her parents were quiet. They looked at each other and then back at him. Elliot tilted his head to the side. “Mel, am I missing non-verbal communication?”
She stepped toward him, taking his hand. Doing so in front of her parents should have felt weird but it didn’t. Maybe she was just too far down this path to care. “You are. What’s going on, Mom and Dad?”
“Melanie, we lived and worked here. Mrs. Boothe was a caring employer. Mr. Boothe took a real interest in you. And you… were terrified of those ghosts to the point that you wouldn’t come in the house. At the age of five you downright refused. It was terrible. We couldn’t leave you, and you weren’t quite in school yet. Mrs. Boothe offered to get a nanny for us, but we were not going to let her do that.”
Elliot scrunched up his nose. “I don’t remember this at all.”
“Well, you were a teenager. I doubt very much that you were focusing on the running of the house.” Her mother laughed, waving her hand in the air. “We had to do something.”
Melanie knew the answer. “You spelled it away. I couldn’t see them. I became blind to ghosts.”
Her mother winced. “Not the most wonderful parenting technique, I’ll grant you. But it worked. You couldn’t see them, and we told you they were gone. I think if you don’t remember that, then you’ve simply forgotten. You were very young.”
“And to be fair,” her father interjected. “We made it so the spell fell away when you were eighteen.”
She chewed on her lips. “I haven’t been back here since then.”
It was not a great feeling to know that she’d had a spell on her for thirteen years that had altered reality for her. Parents doing this to their children were a little bit… not spoken of. It was a dirty little secret that no one discussed. If the child had an unreasonable fear that was somehow affecting life in a negative way, they could make that stop. Healers wouldn’t participate, but they didn’t get in the way of it.
Melanie had never imagined it could happen to her.
Elliot stroked a finger over her hand. “Hold still, Mel.”
A warmth traveled up her arm, and he tilted his head in the way that he did when he was thinking about things. His smile was fast. “You don’t have any other spells on you that are affecting your mind at all. You’re clear.”
“You can tell that?” She shouldn’t have doubted it considering Kim could have seen it, too, but it was never bad to be reassured.
He nodded. “Yep.”
Her mother patted him on the arm. “He always was incredibly powerful. His father was too, but it’s like it doubled in him.”
That was interesting. Elliot was incredibly strong. Just not enough to ward off a curse that the best healers in existence could do nothing for him. Not enough to save his mind. She blinked away her tears.
“Coffee?” Melanie asked her parents. She’d never in all her years heard her father say no to caffeine. He didn’t this time either.
* * *
Several hours later, the house alerted them that Lawson was back, and her parents rose to their feet to leave. It had been such a nice, easy visit, but she needed to get back to studying the books she’d been sent if she was going to make sense of this at all.
Her father stopped to shake Elliot’s hand, and her mother linked her arm with Melanie’s.
“So,” the older woman whispered. “You and Elliot?”
Her cheeks heated up. They’d done nothing to hide it and her parents were smart, intuitive people. “We both know this can’t go anywhere. For now, it just feels right.”
Her mother cupped Mel’s cheek. “There will be nothing but pain with this. You’re a grown woman, and if things were different and Elliot wasn’t… going to end the way he was… I’d be thrilled. He’s the first person I’ve ever seen you have chemistry with. And he made you laugh a lot today. I just worry. Come home when this is over, and we’ll figure out your next step together. It can’t be all or nothing, Mel.”
She didn’t understand that last part. “What do you mean?”
“You had to leave the big corporate magical law firms because they stifled you. I get that. You always worked best alone. But then you went straight into being you versus the bad witches out there all alone.” She sighed. “Isn’t there some sort of safe in between?”
That was a good question. “I don’t know. I need to figure that all out. I’ll come see you when this is over. After I get rid of the ghosts.”
“Easier to get rid of the ghosts than think about other things?” Her mother cocked her eyebrow and Melanie resisted groaning. No matter how old she got there were still things her mother did that made her feel like she was five.
Not to mention she was probably right. Her parents left quickly after that, leaving her with Elliot, alone in the hall. Edward had said he was going to make sure they had everything they needed for the gardeners—the living kind—to come next week. She hadn’t seen him in a while.
She turned toward Elliot. “It was good to see them.”
“For me, too. Your dad is so funny. I forgot about his wicked sense of humor. What were we doing right before they got here?”
Had he forgotten because it was another thing he’d lost or just in the course of things that happened sometimes?
“I was going to study up on ghosts.” She deliberately didn’t tell him about the journal. Not remembering it made him stressed, and she didn’t want to do that to him. Anxiety couldn’t help anything.
“Oh, that’s right.” His smile told her this wasn’t a lost memory. “And I’m going to write. Let’s do that. Then I want to get you naked again.”
Her cheeks immediately heated up. “Does it both
er you that my parents totally know we’re sleeping together?”
His mouth fell open. “Do they?”
“They do.” Had he not picked up on that? “It was probably the holding hands.”
He scratched his head. “You told your parents we were holding hands?”
“No, they just saw it. When they were here.” As she spoke the words she realized what was happening. Her heart fell into her stomach.
“When were your parents here?” Elliot paled.
So this was going to be how it happened. It wasn’t only that he’d forget the journal. That was a small thing. Who cared anyway? Elliot didn’t remember that her parents had just left. Her body went cold for a second. She rubbed her arms.
“Come on, let’s go get something done today.”
He rubbed his eyes. “Did I forget something?”
Was it better to tell him or not tell him? He’d completely forgotten that he forgot the journal. Maybe it didn’t matter at all. There wasn’t any making a memory for this.
“No.” She took his hand. “Let’s go. You’re going to write, and I’m going to work.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
She leaned her head on his arm as they floated together toward the study. She’d only had him for such a short period of time, and she was going to lose him memory-by-memory, moment-by-moment. Curses were always insidious, and she fucking hated this one.
* * *
Melanie stood in the yard. It rained slightly on her, but no one would know what she was doing if she stayed out here. Besides, the weather matched her mood.
“Okay,” she spoke aloud. Elliot was inside writing, as he’d been doing for hours, and the books she’d read hadn’t told her much about how to get rid of ghosts. They were more like folklore. Things humans believed in to explain the unexplainable, when witches had working magic to make the unexpected happen.
But anything could be handled with the right kind of spell. Heck, her parents had made her ghost blind. That meant … well, she wasn’t sure what that meant, but it meant something.
Tragic Magic: Wards and Wands #3 Page 12
